


Threaten a Friend, Court a foe

by Pirate_Chief



Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-05
Updated: 2019-04-05
Packaged: 2020-01-05 04:43:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18358856
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pirate_Chief/pseuds/Pirate_Chief
Summary: Light and dark are not always so simple, and while the tower fights over the Drifter, Neach picks a side and shows his true power.





	Threaten a Friend, Court a foe

Drifter loaded the motes into his specialized bank, meant to contain them for use later, as opposed to the ones at the various Gambit arenas.  Above him his misshapen ghost watched intently, observing as with every mote stored the room burst in luminescence.  It continued like this for a few minutes, Drifter remarking on how easy it had been to keep fed since he started up Gambit Prime, and how much the guardians were enjoying it.  His ghost remained silent, nodding and expressing silently, but no voice every escaping it’s deformed shell.  It floated calmly as the Drifter put the last few in, and with the last luminescence the ghost turned, staring into a darkened corner of the compartment.  “Well, now we got plenty of tasty motes for us and the taken.  Let’s get this thing moving, eh ghost?”  the Drifter says as he looks up at his partner, seeing its red eye fixated on the corner of the room, unmoving and focused.

His hand reached upward, going for the handcannon in his belt, but not getting halfway to it before hearing the distinct metallic click of a similar weapon cocking in warning.  He held up his hands, showing compliance with whomever had him at gunpoint, and turning to the corner to face them.  “My old friend returns, not only to the solar system, but to the tower, after so many centuries.  And within a few months the Tower is choosing sides and at one another’s throats.”  Two red eyes peered out of the black corner, a large dark handcannon with bright wings in the barrel poking out of the shadows.  Drifter smiled, his tell for the little game he played, “Don’t think about it.”  Neach said as he stepped into the light, holstering the weapon as he walked towards the renegade lightbearer.

“Neach!”  The drifter yelled in excitement at having a friend threatening him instead of an enemy.  “I heard you were dead brother.  Like for good dead.”  They clasped forearms in a deep handshake, both grinning like old drinking buddies.

“I was.  A couple thousand years on Luna.”  Neach held up his hand, a jar of clear liquid appearing in it in the same moment Dochas appeared behind Neach’s shoulder.  “Dochas got some guardians together after Crota was ended to resurrect me, and I spent some time taking stock of the system and the tower.”  As he spoke, he poured out two glasses of the clear liquor, a hint of alcohol filling the air, surrounded by the sweet smell of corn, and handed one to Drifter while taking one himself.  “Cheers.”  The clink of glass and a slight slosh of liquid before both sampled the delightful poison.

“Damn,” The Drifter coughed out as he finished his sip, coughing for a moment over the white lightning, “That stuff has more kick than your handcannon old pal.”  The Drifter threw the rest back and spent a minute hacking over the juice, his ghost hovering close in case it needed to bring him back or heal him.  Neach sat drinking his a bit slower, enjoying the sweet liquor and the intoxication it brought to the old exo’s body through a warm relaxation.

“It’s been too long my friend.  So, what happened to you while I was dead?”  Neach asked, settling at the card table, shuffing the deck as he did.

“Left the system, found the dark monsters you talked about.  They could do some horrible things brother, like Thorn.  Killed a guardian permanently just from being there.”  They poured another couple glasses and dealt the cards out.  “Caught a few and made them into something new for the city.”

“So, that’s what happened to your ghost?  A shame, he was good at keeping you on the straight and narrow.”  Neach set the deck to the side, and they started playing, continuing some small talk as they drank slowly, Drifter adapting to the spirits quickly.  After nearly an hour of playing the conversation turned, “So, I heard some guardians with a title of ‘Dredgen’, wanna explain that?”  Neach stared dead into Drifter’s eyes as he said it, an expression of focused and serious anger at his old friend, both remembering the first Dredgen, and everything that occurred during that dark time.

“So, while you were dead a cult sprang up around Yor, his Shadows.  I ran with them for a bit, trying to figure things out.”  Drifter lowered his eyes and his head at this, feeling his friend staring him down, eyes like fire.  “I stopped running with them pretty quick, bunch of zealots and morons.  When I started Gambit I gave the best guardians the title to make it a joke, and insult to them.”

Neach set his hand on Drifter’s shoulder, “Thank you old friend.  I just needed the truth.”  He set one of the Drifter’s tokens on the table, showing his loyalty.  “Trust, brother.  I’ve got your back.”

Drifter sat back at this, no smile, not able to play his games with someone who knew him better than he knew himself.  “Thanks brother.  There are a few other guardians with me, and a bunch of snitches who would sell me out to the Vanguard and that Praxic warlock Aunor.” 

“We’ll be careful” Dochas chimed in, SIVA lines flashing with every word.  “What about the Hero of the Red War?  Whose side are they on?”  The little ghost asked quizzically.

“They haven’t decided yet, been taking their time to think it through.  Can’t say I blame them, at least I can trust them to think about a decision.”  A smile formed on his face, Neach as well, the two discussing Gambit, Prime, and the cargo that the Derelict hauled.  They continued this way for hours, relaxing with the liquor and catching up.  By the time Neach left it was as if no time had passed, and on the way out Neach’s eyes shifted, the inner monster spilling out as he planned to have a serious discussion in the tower.

Neach sat on a ledge of the old tower, charred rubble surrounding him, a black piece of steel sat next to him.  Little in the vaults had survived well enough to be recognized, virtually nothing was functional, and yet this one cannon was little more than dirty.  He was surprised it held no darkness, the Hero of the Red War had purified it years back, the last bit of Yor’s actions undone and a weapon of sorrow turned against the darkness.  His hand and body shuddered and glowed as he reached for it, feeling his darkness grow and seek freedom.  While he rested on Luna he learned of himself, of the broken nature of his soul, and the power it granted him.  That power he had used for millennia, all the light at once, a power that would turn most guardians into little more than ash for their ghosts to resurrect.  The difference was his mind and soul, split between a nobleman seeking to protect, and a monster that reveled in destruction and chaos, with the two brought together and made into one by the fact that they fed on one another, the nobleman giving the monster direction, the monster giving the nobleman power. 

Dochas floated nearby, having understood for centuries, cared little.  He knew his guardian might have been chaos and destruction, but he was good, and fed that good with the corpses of humanity’s foes.  Neach breathed, keeping himself under control as he picked up Thorn, the whispers gone, but the grip felt right, and the suffering it could inflict on the darkness caused a dark and sadistic smile to spread over his face, eyes burning in the night air with joy at the thoughts of using it to feed on a few pathetic hive, and maybe some fallen.  Or maybe an annoying Praxic warlock who had caused more trouble for the tower than she had any right to.  He holstered it on his right side, opposite Samael, remembering how the day previous a scuffle had occurred in the galley, no, the cafeteria, Neach reminded himself, a hunter accosted by a titan over siding with the Drifter.  Neach wanted to step in, but he had made a promise long ago to an old friend not to harm a guardian without good cause and the hunter had it handled.  Aurora, he had heard, one of many guardians to be mistreated by former allies for their choice, though the most famous had also famously not picked a side.  Neach looked forward to hearing how that went, a guardian with the ability to kill gods, save the whole damn city, and avenge the hunter vanguard, Neach’s biggest headache for millennia uncounted, would certainly change everything. 

The sun would rise soon, so the old titan dropped off the ledge, closing his eyes and letting gravity take him before reaching back and grabbing the old spot on the wall, a single handhold that stopped his drop with enough force to make his shoulder pop in a few places.  Devils it felt good, old joints needing the release, as he started climbing back up to the new tower, his fun little path worn by more than a few hunters he taught so they could escape if need be.  It was a quick climb, and he found his way to the Annex, looking over the quarters of his old friend and the Black Armory’s Ada-1.  She had been standoffish with Neach at first till he told her about the collapse, and made it clear he was in no mood for her attitude as he was one of the few people who could understand how she felt.  Now she sat looking over the numbers of weapons forged by guardians, checking logs and the status of the forges, busy work till her customers returned for frames and bounties.  In the Drifter’s space sat a bank to be repaired, the rogue had always been diligent with keeping his tech working, especially when it kept him fed.  One such mote Neach pulled out, reminded of the ships that had assailed Earth in the collapse, releasing monsters of dark form and purpose, beasts he now knew waited far from the galaxy, though on the move now that the Traveler was awake again. 

Walking out of the room he rolled the mote in his hand, stepping out into the small hanger hallway that saw use for the first time in centuries, and squeezed, the mote shattering and the cock of a gun as his monster aimed Thorn at his visitor.  “Aunor I take it, do yourself a favor, don’t try to stalk and spy on people.  You’re no hunter, and I’ve been paranoid longer than you’ve been risen.”  Neach turned to face the warlock who had stepped from the dark stairwell, not sure if she planned to ambush him violently or to discuss something.  Behind her was a creature that was nearly identical to Neach, only taken.  Two red eyes upon its face instead of the single glowing white one, its horns were long and curved up a good 8 inches, and glowing white on the ends, and a crown of light above the head.  Its back had two wings of light folded behind it, Neach had two wings of darkness to match, and the claws of the second Neach glowed, Thorn filling its right hand and burning with hunger.  “I don’t take kindly to threats, as you can tell.”

“This is no threat titan, not yet,” arc energy burst on the wall, hidden mics exploding from her power, “but seeing an ally of the Drifter wielding the darkness as a weapon might damn him faster than any other evidence I find.”  She stared the exo down, a standoff between warriors.

“Darkness?  He wielded darkness and light before the Iron Lords ever met kid.”  Dochas exclaimed as he appeared, fearless as ever.  “Besides, that shade is no different from him than your hand.  That was the cost he paid to protect the Traveler.  You only died and forgot who you were…” Dochas stopped, realizing he overstepped, but Neach finished the sentence.

“I watched the world end, and the darkest part of me was given power.  You have the luxury of ignorance, the ability to believe in something simple, unlike the awoken, unlike me.”  Neach had stepped closer with every word and stood over his adversary with a dark mood.  He raised his hand, two metal claws pressed together, and snapped, the world turning monochrome and light spilling into the hall from outside and from the bank.

“This is…the ascendant plane?!  How?!”  Aunor tried to step back, quickly remembering the weapon of sorrow pointed at her, fear filling her eyes as he ghost appeared, frantically searching around.  Dochas came close and spoke to it softly, comforting it.

“I fought in this place when the world ended, killing a few beasts.  That action marred me, filling my soul with darkness in the way the Traveler did with Light.  It’s a drain to come here, but you need to understand.”  Neach walked to the main hall, looking at the Traveler that still shone even in this dark place.  “Drifter is not evil, not the next Yor.  I…I am a threat to our foes, and more.  I hunger for battle, for strife, destruction and chaos, but also desire to protect and defend those who are innocent.”  Neach waved his hand and the world became what is should be once more, the creature standing in front of him, shaking and twitching before is disappeared.

“You have made your point.  But my agents will still seek evidence.”  She walked out to leave, turning to say, “I heard stories about you, how the vanguard and the city hated you.  I see why now, I also see why we need you.”  She walked away quickly, Neach staring at the broken god he defended so long ago.  He hoped for peace but was afraid what would happen if they ever found it.  Would he become like Yor, or worse, embrace the darkness and wield it uncontested?  He crossed his arms, sides heavy with the cannons he wielded, Dochas joining him in the view.

“You wanna head to the EDZ right?  That hunter, Aurora needs a friend.”  Neach looked at Dochas, the ghost always cared about the other guardians, especially the outcasts like his own charge. 

“If you think she would accept a titan as a friend.”  They chuckled at that.  “Load up my playlist, I wanna hear a few cabal scream in fear.”  The smile on the exo’s face showed his dark sadism, one horn growing with the release.

 


End file.
